Submotion Orchestra ‘Fragments’ Review by Allee Futterer

There’s a lot of animosity between traditionalist musicians and the modern developments in the electronic music scene; lots of bitter purists talking about the decline of credible music and musicians. The DJ and the synthesizer caused a big stink in the 80’s, thinking that pushing a button and scratching vinyl wasn’t really, “music”.

Nowadays we have 10 writers on every pop song and hits banging out, one after another with no real inspiration. Luckily we have England and more importantly, Submotion Orchestra, a fantastic electronic band that plays all of their music… live.

Their most recent release “Fragments” shapes the sound of our generation and paints a beautiful picture of the past. While this album has lots of “bass drops” and great dub-step elements, it’s also filled to the brim with heartfelt melodies and haunting trumpet solos; the kind of music that makes you feel alive. After my first listen I was convinced this was all “produced” and then recreated live, but following my interview with Chris Hargreaves, their bassist, I was fascinated to learn that the whole thing was recorded with live instruments. In listening to this record it is absolutely impossible to not notice the caliber of musicians on this project and the amount of love saturating their music.